Self-Destruct
by Firebirdie
Summary: Two broken Sith fight their way to the heart of the Foundry. RP/co-written with Mother of Ducklings; sequel to "Social Call."
1. Chapter 1

**A/N:** Another RP-turned-fic featuring Evren and Mother of Ducklings' Ravaszhi—now with actual chapters, consistent POV throughout each section, and an extra-casual attitude towards SWTOR's canon timeline \o/

Content warning for canon-typical violence, past abuse, past torture, body horror, hand trauma, and mentions of genocide.

 **Self-Destruct**

 **o.O.o**

The crew of the _Dorin's Sky_ are bundled off to the brig without further incident. Or objection from Moff Phennir. Always nice when _not_ slaughtering everyone in sight goes unquestioned. As the newly-installed Imperial helmsman lays in a course for the Foundry, Evren paces across the bridge behind him, port to starboard and back, restless energy crackling under his skin. The helmsman's unease prickles at his awareness. He should stop. He should really, really stop, if only for the sake of the crew's equanimity.

He keeps pacing like a caged manka cat.

The communications officer nervously clears his throat. "My . . . lord? A transmission from an approaching shuttle. Sith clearance, requesting to board. My lord."

Evren glances over at the officer, who can't hold his gaze for more than a second or two. Never noticed that, before, but after Oricon . . . Inconsequential. _Focus_. "Did they give a reason for their visit? Because unless it's a damn good one, request denied."

"A last minute addition to the strike team. They're—most insistent, my lord."

He exhales. "Fine."

The comms officer nods, visibly relieved to have avoided a confrontation with a rival Sith lord, and begins transmitting docking codes.

The last thing Evren wants right now is to deal with some pushy Dark Lord who will insist upon the bloodiest possible solution to this mess. And with his luck . . . _My, we're in a cynical mood today_ , he thinks, and twists his face into something approximating polite neutrality as he stalks over to the bridge blast doors to greet the new arrival. Or confront them, if need be.

The doors hiss open. Evren freezes as the Force and his eyes give two very different impressions of the figure outside. " _Ravaszhi_?"

The newcomer bows, as befits a lower-ranking Sith greeting the Emperor's Wrath. "Ravaszhi Dzwoyat-chul, my lord. My master Darth Ikoral sent me to assist."

His accent is different. Old Sith, rich and harsh and musical. He's wearing all black: robes, layered tunic, trousers, boots; his hair is long enough to be tied back to keep it out of his face. Same facial piercings, though, and same magma-bright eyes—but the context, the circumstances, it's all wrong, and stars his aura is—

Ravaszhi feels like death, like rot and emptiness and slow starvation.

 _What happened to you, what HAPPENED—?_

"Your aid is . . . most appreciated," Evren says haltingly. He steps aside with a mechanical gesture to join him on the bridge. "Please. We were just about to make the jump to hyperspace." Inane and irrelevant but they're surrounded by Imperials and no matter how many questions clamor to be given voice he can't, not here and now.

Not aloud, but—Evren cracks his shields, reaches out tentatively with _worry_ and _fear_ and _friend_.

And it's a risk, it's always a risk but he cannot allow himself to believe that the moment of vulnerability will be his last. Not like this. Not with someone who he is— _is_ —proud to call a friend.

For a long moment, there's nothing. Only the decayed and withered edges of a once-bright spirit, creeping out like contagion past the shields Evren taught him. Then for an instant, Ravaszhi's defenses loosen, the tiniest of fractures, and there's—Evren doesn't know what to make of it. Too brief and too faint to read before it's gone.

"Do we have a plan of attack for when we arrive?" Ravaszhi's asking.

. . . They're still talking. Right. Evren wrenches himself back to the present, to the coming battle. Foundry. Escaped Jedi. He is the Emperor's Wrath, and this is his reason for existence, what he's _for_.

What is Ravaszhi here for? What does Ikoral want? Why is Ravaszhi serving—stop. _Stop_. Not now, not yet.

He says, "We don't know much about the layout of the Foundry, but the _Dorin_ 's onboard scanners should give us an idea on arrival. The strike team—you and I, now—will fight its way through to the command center to assume control of the factory. And then we deal with the Jedi prisoner."

. . . Oh hells. Jedi prisoner. _I was a hostage on a Sith battlecruiser_. The word _torture_ lurking beneath the simple statement like a sleeping monster. A then-nameless Jedi breaking again over the memory of what the Empire did to him.

"How much do you know about the Jedi's plans?" Ravaszhi says, voice so even as to be nearly toneless. "My master was vague, but it's why I'm here."

No reaction is better than what happened on Tatooine, isn't it? Evren doesn't bother trying to sell himself the lie. Even if Ikoral doesn't know Ravaszhi's history, the parallels are there. And if he does, and gave him this task anyway . . .

Everything is _wrong_ , in new and exciting ways.

Breathe. Crack a smile. "Well, it most definitely involves war droids," Evren says with forced levity.

Ravaszhi goes along with it. "How fortunate; I have an old model I'm trying to repair. All I've been told is that the Jedi's plans represent a threat to my master's interests, and he has to be stopped at all costs."

Still a tinkerer. That much hasn't changed. "Then we stop him," Evren says, another useless inanity, another beat in the script of Sith discussing an upcoming mission. He looks out the front viewport, hyperspace streaking past in skeins of howling blue. He raises a hand to rub at his eyes, buy time to—to think. Oricon burned them red, and though it's been weeks they're still . . . It doesn't matter. "If we're lucky, there'll be plenty of scrap left over for your own project."

Ravaszhi doesn't run with the topic of droid repair, lets the silence stretch long enough to be uncomfortable. Evren wants to believe it's due to their audience, or not knowing what to say, or—anything but not _wanting_ to just—talk. Connect. Something. Eventually, though, Ravaszhi says, "How long before we arrive? If I'm not needed, I can be preparing."

 _I need you to be okay, I need to know if I can help_ —But Evren can't say it aloud. "Less than an hour. I'll be here if you require anything." Hollow courtesy. Meaningless, for all that he means it.

"My thanks," says Ravaszhi. "I'll return presently." He bows, turns, leaves.

Evren watches him go.

 **o.O.o**

Meditation is almost impossible. The _Dorin's Sky_ is a seething missile of fear and tension racing towards the Foundry, and the asteroid that houses their target is a dark horizon on the edge of Ravaszhi's consciousness, gaping ever closer. The Force licks at his eardrums with a razor tongue, carrying the scent of alien technology and moldering stones, deep underground _._

Something on the surface pulses out of sync with the Rakatan fortress, an almost familiar swell. Ravaszhi recognizes it, and at the same time he doesn't.

He rises, and rests a forearm against the small viewport set into his shuttle cabin's hull. The asteroid's barren surface rises to meet Ravaszhi as the _Sky_ descends, eating up the starry void now with rock, now with craters, now with the Foundry itself.

There's more of it than Ravaszhi had realized. A lot more. If it were just him, it would practically be a suicide mission.

Ravaszhi flattens his scarred palm against the transparisteel, inadvertently scoring it with his nails. _Temptation, Master?_ _Is that your test?_

Somewhere, across the galaxies, Darth Ikoral doesn't answer. It would take a stronger bond than the one they share for that to be possible.

Ravaszhi lets his hand fall back to his side. It doesn't matter. He's not alone, and of all the Sith lords it could have been . . . he's selfishly glad that it's Evren. Even if it leaves him feeling raw and exposed and monstrous, Ravaszhi has already broken so much, lost so much, that this one brightness is everything.

Reaching out, he can sense Evren still on the bridge, armored and solid and real.

Time to quit dawdling and join him.

Ravaszhi draws away from the viewport, and exits his shuttle onto the ship proper. Either the crew is light, or they all avoid him as he makes his way back to the bridge. Ravaszhi doesn't blame them. He knows what he feels like to those with enough sensitivity to pick up on it, which is why he doesn't usually bother masking his Force-signature. It's better for all of them if people keep their distance.

The bridge doors hiss open, and Ravaszhi steels himself against his own insecurities as he steps through. He's here for a reason. It makes this that much easier, having the mask of purpose to hide behind. "Are we detecting any unusual life signs?"

Evren turns, and Ravaszhi is saved from making eye contact as one of the bridge officers responds in the negative. "Humanoids only, my lord," the officer says, "though we are picking up massive energy readings at the factory's core, presumably the generators."

Rakatan technology is Force-infused, practically alive. It could be the generators. Ravaszhi rubs a finger across the line of piercings in his lower lip. It could also be nothing; he's imagined things before, but . . .

"Airlocks are aligned, docking in thirty seconds," an ensign pipes up. "You'll have only a few minutes before the Republic realizes we've hijacked their ship, my lords."

Evren is nodding, turning for the airlock amidships. "We'll make the most of it, then. Lord Ravaszhi—ready when you are."

They'll just have to deal with as it comes, whatever it is. Ravaszhi falls in at Evren's elbow, unclipping his lightsaber as they come to a halt in front of the airlock doors.

There's a dull, echoing thunk from without the hull. "Airlock secure, my lord!"

Evren pulls his lightsabers from his belt.

The doors hiss open, and they move together through the airlock and into the Foundry, straight into a squad of Republic troopers fanned out in front of them.

At their head is a Miraluka Jedi Master, green saber humming, shining out calm and still and driven in the Force. The light around her pulses out of sync with the rest of fortress, familiar and alien and everything Ravaszhi lost.

What he'd sensed from his shuttle. Jedi. _Here._

Evren charges the line. He falls on the troops in a reckoning of rage and burning blades, and Ravaszhi is right beside him, the same rage arcing down his lightsaber like dark fire as he cuts through the troopers' blaster fire and into their bodies, through armor, through bone.

The air is thick with the sweet, sick stench of burned flesh as Ravaszhi closes with the Jedi. He strikes hard and fast, with no grace or finesse at all, nothing to his form but the bitter taste of finally understanding what the price of the mission is: a path of Jedi corpses. That, or they kill Ravaszhi instead. And not just him.

He sees Evren go through the last of the soldiers in his peripheral vision, one trooper wrenched off his feet into enemy blaster fire, a briefly-living shield, the other falling to a lazy flick of the wrist.

The Jedi parries Ravaszhi's downward strike, ripostes— and Evren intercepts the blow and twists his blade around the Jedi's, throws their guard wide open. He's laughing, low and mirthless and sick, and it's so familiar— _nothing changed and nothing helped and he never_ —

Ravaszhi reaches through the Force for the Jedi and _tears_. Blood pours from her ears, and she falters, her pain a miasma leaking through the Force.

Evren snaps his lightsaber around in a short arc and the Jedi's body slithers to the floor, head thudding beside it.

The Jedi's corpse is horribly still. Her blood pools in the crevices between the Foundry's flagstones, inching towards Ravaszhi's feet with whispering fingers.

How many feet of stone over their heads? How many more before it's over?

Evren's voice reaches through the deathly silence and steadies him. "Let's go."

"I was hoping to have a bout of hysteria, for old times' sake," Ravaszhi says dumbly.

Evren tips his head back, Sith tattoos yawning over his throat, grinning. "Might be able to provide one, if you give me a minute or two."

There's something off in Evren's smile. His dark-sun eyes look clear, but…Ravaszhi remembers them being blue. Human eyes aren't supposed to change colors like that.

They're not on the ship any longer, it's safe enough to ask, and Ravaszhi _wants_ to ask— Evren looks so tired—but he doesn't have the right. It's been too long, and it's his own fault. And there's nothing he can _do,_ nothing he can offer to help if Evren is hurt but . . . but that's never stopped him before. Ravaszhi swallows. Steps over the corpse and doesn't look back, dropping the accent if not his shields. "Evren, what happened?"

Evren blinks. "What—happened?" he echoes. "I'm fine. Bit worse for the wear, perhaps, neglected to sleep for a week or so in the middle of a war zone, but that doesn't . . . Ravaszhi, what are you doing here? I thought—you stopped responding to messages and I'd hoped you were on assignment again but—are you all right?"

Ravaszhi hangs his head. Of course Evren would turn the question around. He's kind, he's always been kind, and Ravaszhi has done all but cut him off completely. Evren deserves so much better. "I was dismissed from the Order."

That much is probably obvious, given that he's in Sith space using his real name, but as to what he's doing here . . . what is Ravaszhi supposed to say? That he's willing to slaughter Jedi, the only family he's ever known, all he's ever had or wanted, just to save the nameless strangers that make up his race? Ravaszhi is a monster. The Order was right to have him put away. But—

"A whole week, Evren? You shouldn't . . . it's not safe for you to—"

Evren's laugh cuts him off, slow and clear and teasing, but gentle. "I'm hardly about to make a habit of it, you ridiculous worrier." He looks down. "And—and whatever your reasons, I'm just . . . very glad that you're alive."

Ravaszhi's throat closes. He doesn't deserve that, not from Evren, not after pushing him away. He should sink to his knees and beg for Evren's forgiveness. He doesn't deserve that, either.

There's a rhythmic clanking from down the corridor. Hostility flares into focus, lives bent on ending theirs twined with gossamer-thin threads of energy: droids, the big ones, and troops, and more Jedi.

Always more Jedi.

Evren sighs, shifting his weight. "In retrospect we should probably have gotten this out of the way en-route."

With all those Imperials potentially listening in? There wasn't any time on the way here, and there still isn't any time now. Even still, Ravaszhi isn't sorry for asking. "Someone should worry about you."

Their lightsabers' glow stains the floor, red and purple-back like spilled blood, casting odd shadows over the bodies at their feet. The fortress weighs heavy overhead, but somewhere above the metal and stone that make up the living machinework of the Foundry, the naked sky is stretching away into space, clear and untouchable. Ravaszhi focuses on that, draws in a breath, and doesn't look at the bodies as he moves forward.

He doesn't hear Evren's quiet response— "And you."

 **o.O.o**

 _tbc_


	2. Chapter 2

**o.O.o**

The blast doors ahead are locked down, presumably controlled from the console nearby. Evren hopes it won't take more than his painfully basic grasp of slicing to open them. He taps a key, relaxes slightly when the interface isn't completely incomprehensible. Considerate of the Rakata, really. He's about to start inputting what he hopes are the correct shutdown commands when a voice emanates from the console.

"Stop. It's time we talked," it says. "I am the master of the Foundry. Once the Emperor's prisoner, now the man you've come to destroy."

Not even a little bit full of himself, is he? Evren raises an eyebrow. "Yes, the one would seem to follow the other, wouldn't it . . ."

"Three hundred years ago," the escaped Jedi continues, ignoring him, "I found your Empire in the stars and stood against the Emperor himself. I was betrayed. Defeated. I paid the price as the Emperor ravaged my mind over centuries, but I gave him nothing. I am proof that the dark side can be resisted."

Oh, fantastic, a monologuer. A _smug_ monologuer. What fun.

"You gave him everything," Ravaszhi says. "There's no room to talk about light and dark when the moral scales are weighed in blood."

What? Weighed in—what has this Jedi done? And what, precisely, is this Darth Ikoral's interest in him and in the Foundry?

. . . Ravaszhi is hurting, whatever the specifics, and Evren doesn't know what to do or how to help or—

"You're in no position to weigh morality, _Sith_ ," the Jedi says, calm, patronizing, cold. And then it's back to the monologuing as he continues, "In my time, servants of the Sith invaded the Republic. I gave up everything to seek their masters, and I discovered Dromund Kaas. I have seen the Emperor's corruption—he and everything he's built must be destroyed, or the galaxy will suffer forever.

"You don't need to die with him. Surrender, and you can wait out this war as a comfortable prisoner."

"Right. I'll pass, thanks," Evren says acidly. "Out of curiosity, how _do_ you hope to kill the Emperor?"

The Jedi's answer is immediate, if unhelpful. Why? Why tell them anything? Arrogance, or some ulterior motive? But speculating is a—a distraction from the response itself, because the implications are . . .

"These machines are extermination droids. My infinite army," the Jedi says. And then: "Farewell."

War droids. An ancient factory churning out extermination droids.

 _Everything he's built_.

"He's targeting purebloods, Evren," Ravaszhi says. He joins Evren at the console, not quite meeting his eye, and picks up inputting the half-complete command codes. "I won't be taking him alive."

Evren looks at Ravaszhi and nods. The blast door unlocks, slides open. He ignores it. _Genocide_. Jedi everywhere on this station. They know. They know and they're still—this—he thought they were different, that they were better than—and how many times will it take before he learns that _Jedi don't care_. The ones who do are tasked with the impossible and called weak and evil for shattering. The ones who don't . . .

They wear the robes and preach compassion and they would drown the galaxy in the blood of billions if it meant destroying the Sith.

"Good," Evren says quietly. "Let's find this dead man."

Ravaszhi does make eye contact then, stares, hands still hovering over the console. He seems surprised, as if he'd been expecting an argument. And perhaps Evren should advocate for mercy, perhaps he should force himself to think of the Jedi Master as a victim just as much as Ravaszhi was, but—

All three of them have been victims, in one way or another. They've all suffered. Funnily enough, _most_ of them haven't decided that the wholesale slaughter of an entire civilization is an appropriate coping mechanism.

Ravaszhi's smile is small and tentative and fleeting, but a smile nonetheless. "Thank you."

"What are friends for, if not tearing the throats out of genocidal droid enthusiasts?" Evren says brightly. He shouldn't be joking, no matter how much truth there is to it. But right now— _hells_.

He takes a step towards the blast doors, and the factory beyond. "Onward?"

 **o.O.o**

Another console, another set of blast doors. The treads of Ravaszhi's boots squelch with blood as he walks through them.

"Assessment: you have been exceedingly sporting during our hunt."

Ravaszhi stops before the towering likenesses of the Foundry's Rakatan builders, and a holoprojection of an HK model assassination droid flickers to life in front of him.

"I am HK-47, the master's most faithful ally. Once a mere assassin droid, it is now my burden and my joy to command the Foundry's mechanical armies."

HK . . . postures. He sounds so proud.

Ravaszhi doesn't want to kill the droid, but he'll do what he has to. "Give me control of the extermination droids."

HK shakes his head, something in his posture suggesting an indulgent _tut, tut._ A secondary holo flickers to life beside him, basic schematics for two of the models Ravaszhi and Evren have been fighting. "The extermination droids are my master's crowning achievement," HK says. "They are equipped with bioscanners capable of detecting Sith genetic material."

There's a staticky noise as the schematics vanish, replaced by—

Two anatomical scans. Two close-ups. It's— it's them, their faces, their bones, their bodies rendered in blue and white, every marker of their ancestry outlined and highlighted and labeled, clinical and damning. Every spur and ridge of bone. Every chemical and metabolic quirk.

Ravaszhi's skin crawls with the memory of torture droids setting their clamps into his mangled limbs, laying his bone spurs open to view. Markers and labels swarm over every inch of his scan in humiliating detail. There's nothing human about him, and it's right there in stark relief for anyone to see. He was born to a Sith family, and to the extermination droids and the Foundry's master and the Jedi, that's all Ravaszhi will ever be.

He doesn't mean to look, he doesn't _want_ to look, but Evren's—Evren's right up there beside him, and there are markers on him, too, meaning . . .

"Any organics with Sith ancestry will be slaughtered!" the HK droid says, almost gleeful. "This includes ninety-seven point eight percent of the Imperial population."

Everyone with Sith ancestry. Not just the purebloods, not just Ravaszhi and his family and the rest of their race (including the odd Republic citizen, innocent and alone in a sea of the _right kind of aliens_ ), it's—

It's all of them. Everyone. Slaves and Sith and civilians alike, half the galaxy, beyond billions of people, _younglings_ —

Evren.

If the droids try to get to Evren, they'll be doing it over Ravaszhi's cold, dead body _._ Ravaszhi cracks his blade, thrumming with the same cold rage. "Come out from hiding and I'll give you a Sith."

"Commentary: As much as I'm looking forward to butchering our enemies planet-by-planet, I have missed the personal touch," the HK unit says conversationally, kneeling down closer to their level.

Evren ignites his lightsabers, as the droid stands again. "Your bones will make excellent trophies to commemorate my return to assassination," HK says.

The holo vanishes and machinery begins to groan and grind to life up ahead.

Next to Ravaszhi, Evren bares his teeth. "Would you mind terribly if there's not much left to salvage of this thing by the time we're done? Though I doubt your project would benefit from bits of something this obsolete."

Ravaszhi keeps his eyes locked on the churning column of Rakatan machinery at the center of the room, but he's watching the ranks of dormant war droids out of his peripheral vision. There are hundreds, and all programmed to target and exterminate anything with so much as a drop of _Sith_ blood.

And all this time, he'd thought Evren was human.

"I won't lose any sleep over this thing's wasted chassis." Ravaszhi's voice is shaking, pain and fury and fear—he'd thought Evren was _human_ —and he has never felt like such a fraud as he coils the dark emotion tight. He half-crouches, tensed and ready to throw himself at the HK the moment it shows itself.

Then the metal construct screams and whines into the gloom above and he's flying, blood-bright lightsaber poised for a downward thrust between neck and shoulder. It leaves him wide open from hip to neck for the spare seconds he's exposed.

Fire boils out of HK's wrist and Ravaszhi screams, pent-up rage shredding his vocal cords in a kinetic shield that barely saves him in time. He falls and rolls and comes up singed, blade snapped around at the last second.

A broad streak flickers down HK's body shield like a scar.

Ravaszhi rises with a grin that's mostly snarl, smoke coiling off his robes, and motions the droid forward with a two-fingered taunt.

He deflects HK's answering blast of fire, just as Evren melts into focus behind them and wrenches at the droid's interior mechanisms with the Force. HK emits a yowl, lurching around to re-aim for Evren.

Who dives away, laughing. "Some targeting protocols!"

"Retraction: You're not entirely unskilled after all. Activating assassination protocols level two."

 _Almost complimentary_ , Ravaszhi thinks, pressing forward after the weak part of the shield he now knows that's there. It's near enough to the droid's mechanical vertebrae that if he can get in that close—

"Extermination units, converge!"

Pale arcs of electricity slam into the hollow towers at the four corners of their little battleground in an eruption of light and noise, hard enough to rock Ravaszhi on his feet. The HK winks out of Ravaszhi's vision to the whine of four sets of blaster-canons priming. Exterminator-war droids, four of them, one at each corner of the raised area surrounding the power core.

Ravaszhi throws his lightsaber at one of them to draw its attention and charges another, throwing out his hand to call back his blade.

He needn't have bothered. He can feel a warning thrum as the other two droid's targeting systems lock onto him, whatever sorting algorithms of genetic purity they use painting him as the higher value target.

Evren sprints across the platform and slams into one of the droids' sides, lightsabers leaving deep glowing furrows in its armor plates as he spins. He turns, turns, _throws_ , and his offhand blade buzzes across the intervening space to gouge through the last droid's chassis. He calls it back as the droid veers towards him rather than Ravaszhi.

Ravaszhi deflects his droids' fire into the machinery at the platform's edge, bringing down a hail of sparks. The air turns scorched with smoke and fried wiring, and every deflected blast draws a deep, ringing groan out of the Foundry's heart. The Force screams around him, livid and fractured throughout the machines.

Evren is a bright, bright blur in Ravaszhi's peripheral vision, hurtling and twisting between the two droids he's engaged almost too fast to follow. He jumps, flips back midair, lands behind the first droid—and the second's stream of laserfire screams through the space he just vacated, hammering into its comrade. The droid doesn't stop shooting even as the damaged one keens and staggers. The first droid goes down and Evren blasts the broken machine forward. It hits the other droid, knocks its aim off.

Evren takes a flying leap and brings his sabers down and around and through the droid's midsection, slicing off arm cannons as the rest of it falls to pieces.

The last of the replicating machines goes up in smoke, and Ravaszhi finds himself pinned between his two war droids. He's forced to give ground under the weight of the fire, moving one grudging step at a time to buy himself the space to move.

Something pulls at his senses, a half-warning from somewhere between his gut and the base of his skull, and Ravaszhi ducks to the side. A spray of blaster fire goes over his head.

"Mockery: I thought you were going to show me a Sith, meatbag!"

The HK is back.

Ravaszhi's dodging fire from three sides now. He throws himself out of the way of another salvo, clenching his hand into a fist until his nails bite skin for the pain and the focus. And then he laughs, low and hoarse and unhinged. He has _Sith_ for them alright.

Ravaszhi drives his nails into his palm until blood streams down his fingers and then lunges, left hand out for focus, and seizes HK's weapon with the Force. There's not enough power behind it to wrench the weapon away, just enough to keep the droid from pulling back the trigger as Ravaszhi's bloodied right hand goes straight for HK's visual receptors, smearing its face with his black, _Sith_ blood.

The extermination droids whip around like war hounds, re-target and lock on HK in the blink of an eye while Ravaszhi is still right on top of them. The war droids open fire, too late for anything but insidious calm. _Yes,_ Ravaszhi thinks, _this, please this—_

Evren slams into his side and they hit the floor in a tangle of arms and legs, skidding across the platform and out of the way just as HK's shields overload in burst of blue and gold sparks. He takes the brunt of the fall and rolls free, is already moving again, is standing and hurtling both sabers into one of the droid's exposed back before Ravaszhi has wholly processed the fact that he's still alive.

The droid goes down in a heavy, metallic screech, a plume of smoke rising from its wrecked chassis.

The last droid standing is listing to the side, half taken apart by the HK's last salvo, trying to retarget. Ravaszhi rises on shaking legs, calls his lightsaber and stalks towards it. One smooth motion has its head clanking to the floor.

Ravaszhi powers down his blade. "We should do this more often," he croaks. His voice feels like it's been dragged through Belsavis' tombs by the heels.

Evren's lightsabers snap to his hands and die with a soft, single hiss. "Are you all right?" he asks. He sounds shaken. "Your hand . . ."

"It's not bad." Ravaszhi angles his body between Evren and his hand reflexively, aware of how his black, Massassi blood must look. "I'm just winded. And you? Are you . . .?" He lets it trail away, looking Evren over and seeing no obvious injuries.

"Never better." Evren cracks a small smile. "I've kolto if you need it, if only to stop the bleeding . . . And, er, sorry about the fall."

Apologizing, when the fall literally saved Ravaszhi's life. Ravaszhi tries to laugh, but it comes out harsh and strained. "I should be apologizing to you for the fall; you broke mine."

Evren pulls a medpack from his belt, shaking his head. "Falling every which way is hardly the worst outcome, all things considered." His tone is light, and he takes a step closer, holding out a hand. "May I . . .? It can be difficult to bandage wounds like that one-handed."

His words are punctuated by the patter of blood falling to the floor. Ravaszhi looks at his hand. He's sliced himself deep enough that it won't heal on its own, not anytime soon anyway, and the last thing he needs is for his lightsaber to slip out of his grip during a fight. Still, he doesn't want to spook Evren. His nails, when they grew back, came in long and dark and sharp. They're claws, really. Taken with his four-fingered hands, the result is . . . generally disturbing.

"Thank you," Ravaszhi says tentatively. He comes forward and holds out his hand, slowly. "It's not as bad as it looks."

Evren takes his hand without comment, and begins to clean the blood away.

Ravaszhi's hand looks monstrous between Evren's, but there's not a shred of horror on his face, and Ravaszhi loves him for it.

Evren's movements are careful and gentle as he applies disinfectant, and then kolto, before wrapping Ravaszhi's palm with a bandage. "Please don't make a habit of that," he says softly. "Not that it wasn't an ingenious tactic, but . . ."

"I won't." Ravaszhi takes his hand back, and resists the temptation to tuck them both away against his sides. He flexes his newly bandaged fingers instead, trying for a reassuring smile. "I don't plan to leave enough of them operational to pull that more than once."

If Evren sees through to his discomfort, he mercifully doesn't call Ravaszhi on it. "I like this plan much better," he says. "Ready when you are."

Ravaszhi casts a look at the broken HK.

Everything but the head is practically slagged. He shakes his head. "No accounting for taste," he mutters. Of all the things to inherit . . . but he walks over and pokes at the chassis with his boot anyway, then picks up the head and peers at the circuitry inside, looking for anything useful. "Do you mind if I salvage this?"

"By all means." Evren coughs. "What are you building, if you don't mind my asking?"

"I'm rebuilding m—my uh, my mother's assassination droid." Ravaszhi flinches at himself. How long a Sith and he still can't apply personal possessives without a crutch? He's going to have to get used to the idea of possessions sooner or later.

He covers with humor, giving Evren an exaggeratedly glum look. "You think the whole line has the same sense of humor?"

Evren eyes the severed head in his hands dubiously. "Perhaps it's less irritating when it's not directed at you?"

Ravaszhi huffs a laugh in agreement, squinting one eye at what looks like the part he's missing to gauge sensitivity, before carefully sliding it out with the Force. "Personally, I think she kept it around on purpose to annoy her Jedi friends. Shall we?"

As they make their way out of the chamber, Evren asks, "You . . . found your family, then?"

A lopsided smile tugs at Ravaszhi's mouth. Technically they'd found him, and they never would've been able to if he hadn't been bumbling around Sith space as a young Knight, all that time ago. "Would you believe they've been stalking me since . . . just before I met you, actually?"

"Really? That's . . . impressive."

Something in Evren's tone makes Ravaszhi turns his head. The questions are there, lurking behind Evren's eyes— w _ere they the ones who cut your hands open and took your fingers out, the ones who did all this—_

But he doesn't ask, and Ravaszhi loves him even more. He doesn't want to explain to Evren that he'd asked for this.

"Are they treating you well?" Evren asks after another beat.

Too well. Better than he deserves. It's _not_ funny but—but the Dzwoyat-chul family would storm an entire planet (again) if one of their own was at risk, and Ravaszhi can't help but laugh. It's raw at first, and then it's wet, and Ravaszhi shakes his head again, blinking back tears. "Yes, Evren. They're treating me well." When his voice is steady, he says, "You're welcome to visit me at the estate on Ashas Ree."

"Thank you," Evren says. "I might take you up on that sometime." He smiles, and after a moment coughs and adds: "I mean it— just— thank you."

"Of course." Ravaszhi's heart sinks a little when Evren doesn't accept, but it's probably for the best. He's a danger to others as well, after all. And then, partly to change the subject, partly because it's only polite after Evren's inquiry into his own family welfare: "Are you and your apprentice well?"

Evren laughs. "She's a Lord now, finally. Reporting to one of the very few reformist Dark Councilors and having the time of her life."

Reformist Dark Councilors sound . . . too good to be real. Ravaszhi is about to ask, when Evren adds, quietly: "I miss her."

Ravaszhi knows that pain, only too well. He wishes there were something he could say, but he still aches when he thinks of the friends he lost, and there are no words that have ever helped him. Evren is horribly brave, to let her go willingly. "She must be very proud of you."

"One can only hope." Evren sighs. "All I know is that I could not be more proud of _her_."

And that's something else Ravaszhi knows— the warmth of a master's pride— ironically, for the first time in his life. He rubs the pad of his thumb between his first and second finger, over the fat, pale scar where his middle finger used to be. It had been worth it. It _had_. Besides, what had he been saving all those fingers for, anyway? He's never going to teach a Jedi youngling how to place their hands on their first training saber's hilt, and he's never going to help a Padawan of his own add beads to their braid.

His master is pleased with him, and that's all that matters.

Ravaszhi lightens his tone, taking his cue from Evren's tendency to dispel weight with humor. "Who knows," he says, "you may see yourself a grandmaster one of these days, if she trains an apprentice of her own."

Evren gives an exaggerated shudder. "Please don't say that, I'm not ready to even _think_ of that, gods . . ."

 **o.O.o**

 _tbc_


	3. Chapter 3

**o.O.o**

The last set of blast doors pulses in the Force, clear as a holosign to those with the affinity to feel it. Behind them, a corona of warm yellow light masking something dangerous and _wrong_ —a star about to go nova, shining and bloated.

Evren and Ravaszhi look at each other; Ravaszhi tips his head at the doors and takes a breath as though he's about to say something, but the blast doors interrupt him by grinding open. Inside, a wide platform overlooks the vast emptiness of the chamber beyond, and at the far end, a console glows faintly—presumably, the main terminal from which the entire Foundry can be controlled.

The Jedi Master is kneeling in the center of the platform, his back to them. A dark hooded robe obscures any identifying features. Very dramatic.

"That HK unit you destroyed," he says, rising, "he waited loyally for me for three hundred years. I can rebuild him, but it won't be the same. Can't you see you're on the wrong side of history? The Emperor is death: for you, for me, for the galaxy!"

"Whoever you are now," Ravaszhi says as they enter the chamber proper and stand before the Jedi, "whoever you used to be, you're a fool if you think wiping out nearly half the galaxy will save anyone. The Sith who live will glut themselves on the horror you're trying to unleash, and the innocent will be the ones who pay for it."

The Jedi turns to them. Though shadowed by the hood, his face is unremarkable, practically generic, if a bit raw-boned. A battered lightsaber hangs at his belt. And he still feels like a dying star, something massive and powerful and dangerous about to consume everything nearby in its death throes. "There are no innocents under Vitiate's rule," he says. "Only shades of guilt for the Empire's crimes. You are all touched by his evil. In the long run, more lives will be saved this way."

"You claim the moral high ground even as you attempt genocide? Your powers of self-justification are truly formidable," Evren says coolly.

The Jedi shakes his head. "I will mourn for the dead, and do what I must. Long ago, I went to war—I accepted violence and darkness, and the Emperor called to me from across the galaxy." He turns aside, looks away. "He made me a Sith Lord and named me Darth Revan. I killed for him—I turned on the Republic—but I've found redemption." Spreading his arms as if to encompass the Foundry and all its horrors, _Revan_ —difficult as it is to believe—seems . . . calm. Evren can sense no agitation in him, only steely resolve.

The broken part of him wants to push. Toy with Revan. Keep him talking, learn exactly where to strike. Dig his claws in and _rip him apart_.

If anyone deserves it . . .

Evren is _tired_.

. . . And Revan is still talking. Stars, how can he possibly still be talking. His entire life story, abridged but only just, how he was betrayed and captured by the Jedi and redeemed and left to seek the Emperor, and was betrayed and captured _again_ —

"Do I look like I give a damn?" Evren snaps. "You want to obliterate my people, my culture, my home. If you think for one second that your tragic backstory is of any interest—"

"That's enough!" shouts the Jedi.

Evren smiles thinly. Ah. Hates being interrupted and dismissed. Good to know.

"Is it, though?" Ravaszhi fires back. "You're not special, Revan. Other Force-users have been prisoners of Jedi and Sith, and they don't plan mass genocide as soon as they escape. Face it: you died a long time ago, and you came back wrong. You belong with the rest of the Republic's monsters."

He cracks his lightsaber. "Fortunately for you, I don't take prisoners."

"You cannot stop me," Revan says. "No one can." He produces a mask from his robes, raises it to his face, slow and theatrical. Evren can practically hear the dramatic musical cue.

The idiot's back is still turned on them.

Evren snaps a hand out and _pulls_.

The mask rockets towards Evren. Unfortunately for Revan, his head is in the way. It smashes into his face. He cries out in pain and shock—Evren sincerely hopes that faint crunching noise was his nose going—and staggers backwards.

Evren catches the mask one-handed, igniting a lightsaber with the other, as Revan lurches back to a more or less dignified stance, rounding on them wild-eyed and infuriated, groping for his own lightsaber as blood oozes from his nostrils. Evren tsks. "Oh, dear. The years have _not_ been kind to you, Master Jedi," he lilts.

Ravaszhi laughs, clean and clear—Evren could _sing_ —then spins his lightsaber, pulls it back two-handed in mockery and challenge. "You'll find your form to be somewhat . . . outdated, Revan," he says.

Revan's eye twitches. Recognition morphs into fury. He activates his saber—violet, as if he's trying to make a statement about how very unique he is; it's so _cute_ —and says, "I've saved the Republic twice before—I've fought Dark Lords and armies of Mandalores—"

"Oh, shut up and fight, already," Evren says, lazily tossing the mask aside. It falls, clatters on the ground.

Revan's rage is _beautiful_. He's powerful—oh by the stars he is powerful, and Evren should probably be much more concerned by that power—but he's unfocused, distracted by his irritation with Evren and Ravaszhi. There goes that steely calm.

Ravaszhi lunges in first, falling upon Revan with a series of calculated strikes rather than going for the power attacks; Evren follows suit, darting blows to sting and wound. Not all-out, not yet, and it's clear why as Revan blocks and retaliates. The Jedi is a force of nature. Ravaszhi intends to weather him out.

Evren tries to flank him; Revan continues to parry, effortless, as if he's still in plain view. His combat style is odd, though, as if he's wavering between something better suited to mundane vibroblades and duelist's Makashi.

"I was Sith. I am Jedi!" Revan shouts, flinging out his hands to blast Evren and Ravaszhi away. Evren hisses through his teeth and twists midair to land on his feet, absorbs the impact with his knees, kicks into a Force-enhanced jump to close the distance again—

Lightning. He shouldn't have flipped for extra momentum on the downswing. Evren gasps as Revan's attack tears through him. It hurts, it always hurts. But he isn't helpless, not anymore, never again. Electrical dampeners in his armor certainly help, too. He arcs his sabers forward and down, forces Revan to retreat a step to avoid the blades.

Ravaszhi has thrown up his sword arm, catching most of the lightning directed at him on the blade, deflecting it back at its master. Revan snarls and keeps pouring power into the storm, though he has to block his own redirected lightning with one hand.

There's a rumbling, and the room bucks under their feet. Evren stumbles, recovers; Ravaszhi rolls with it, barely avoiding a piece of falling rock, comes up inside Revan's guard.

The Jedi hits him with a wall of pure Force before Ravaszhi can land a blow, and he hurtles across Evren's peripheral vision, towards the edge of the control platform. Evren's heart jumps to his mouth for a horrible second—but Ravaszhi is fine, he doesn't fall, _he does not fall_ —

That moment's inattention nearly kills him. The Force screams a warning. He skips backwards, raises his blades back to guard— _fool boy, never give them an opening unless you want to die_ —and it's still not enough to avoid Revan's diagonal slash. It would have sliced him from left hip to right shoulder. It _does_ , for all that he catches only the tip of the blade and his armor takes the worst of it.

But in the frozen instant between awareness of and reaction to it, Revan's blow has left the Jedi wide, wide open.

Evren telegraphs a downward strike at Revan's head, both sabers whining with the motion. Revan shifts his blade to block, the beginnings of a triumphant smile pulling at his scarred face.

Evren twitches one saber aside and around and _through_.

Revan's smile freezes. "No . . ." He looks down at the red blade burning an ever-widening hole through his torso, cries out in pain as Evren wrenches it sideways, freeing it from his ribcage. His violet saber drops as his grip slackens and he falls to his knees. And then an odd expression crosses his face. Almost . . . peace?

"And in the end," Revan whispers, "as the darkness takes me, I—"

Evren spins his lightsaber around. One more headless Jedi for the count.

. . . His chest _really_ hurts.

 **o.O.o**

Ravaszhi picks himself up from the floor as Revan folds—dies—and his death falls on the sanctum in a slow, quiet emptiness. A Jedi, then a Sith, then a Jedi again, but only just a madman in the end.

It could've been him.

It can still be him. There will always be places to lie and dream, underground, with the rest of the Republic's monsters.

Ravaszhi shudders and turns away.

There is a long, molten scar in Evren's armor where Revan's lighstaber must have slashed him.

Ravaszhi's heart jumps into his throat as he rushes to his side, reaching for Evren's Force-signature fast enough to give himself vertigo— but it's shallow, it hasn't touched his ribs and it's not threatening his organs. A flesh wound, as far as things go with lightsabers. "You're hurt," he says, reaching for the medkit tucked into his beltpouch.

Evren sucks in a shallow breath. "Ow," he says. "Yes. I think I'm going to sit down now." He doesn't sit so much as wobble over to the nearby control console and lean against it. "Are—are you?"

What a stupid question. Evren's _injured_ and he's asking—but of course he's asking. He's Evren Straik. "Unhurt," Ravaszhi says, indulging him. He opens the medkit, but then pauses, eyeing the slash in Evren's armor. It's going to have to have to come off, obviously, but if it were him…Evren might want be alone. "Can I help? I'm not much of a Force-healer, but . . ." he trails off, gesturing to the medkit.

"Oh g-good. And that would be—v-very nice, thanks," Evren says, wincing. "I love armor. I r-really love armor."

Ravaszhi winces along with Evren when he starts to stutter. If he sounds this bad, it might be worse than he can sense. "I'll have to take this off," he says, just to be sure, reaching for the catches on Evren's armor.

"P-please." Evren gestures, completely unconcerned.

Ravaszhi takes off the piece and sets it aside. He deliberately doesn't react when he sees how it looks under the armor, even though it's ghastly. Evren doesn't need his worry. He needs a fully equipped medical facility, but they have to get him to one, first. This will be easiest if I take all this off and wrap your ribs," Ravaszhi says, pointing to the pauldrons, vambraces, and upper bit of the under suit. _Obviously_ , you couldn't bandage a covered wound, but . . .

But maybe Ravaszhi isn't just projecting, because Evren almost looks like he's going to refuse for a moment.

"At—at your leisure," Evren says finally.

His speech is slow enough to be alarming, but panic won't help here. Ravaszhi makes quick work of the rest of the armor, stacking it neatly next to Evren's chest piece, and then hesitates. Again. Lightsabers cauterize as they cut. Everyone who uses them knows not to pull fabric away from a lightsaber wound. They're burns; the fabric becomes broiled into the skin and lifting it . . . lifts off the flesh, too. Makes it worse. Ravaszhi should cut Evren's under-suit off, but that will mean using a lightsaber—or Force, his claws— that way that close to Evren's skin, and it's bad enough already.

Ravaszhi reaches for the medical supplies uncertainly. "This will make it hard to breathe when I wrap it," he warns, looking up at Evren to gauge his lucidity.

"I'll m-manage," Evren says, forcing a smile that looks more deranged than reassuring. "'ve had worse . . ."

Lucid enough, under the circumstances, and at least Evren doesn't appear to be in shock, not yet, but his discomfort gnaws at Ravaszhi. It's familiar, it is _all too familiar_ , and he doesn't know how to put him at ease.

The nearest medical facility is on Vaiken, and Vaiken is crawling with Sith. Evren's under-suit is ruined already, and so is his armor. He'll be a walking target, unless the Wrath is so powerful in their position that they deter power-hungry Sith by sheer title. Even Ravaszhi's not that naive. "How attached to this bodysuit are you?" he asks reluctantly.

"We've been through a lot t-together," Evren says. "Might be t-time to retire it, though . . ."

"Good to know," Ravaszhi says. He unbuckles the vambraces keeping his robes' sleeves in check, irrationally stalling. It's _necessary,_ it's for Evren's own safety, but—

But he can't bear for Evren to watch. "Do me a favor and close your eyes for a second?" It's asking for a lot of trust. More than Ravaszhi deserves. He cautiously drops what little mental shields he's been maintaining, letting Evren see the residual fear of exposure he's carried since Kilran's warship. "You're safe with me. I promise."

Evren smiles, and it's a less alarming smile. "I know," he says, and closes his eyes.

Ravaszhi sets his vambraces aside. Then he slips his nails under the edge of Evren's bodysuit, manages not to scream out loud— dear gods below he is really going to do this— and…

Tears Evren's shirt off of him with his claws. As gently as possible, avoiding the singed fabric at the edges of the wound.

Then he sheds his robe, stabs Evren in the ribs with a stimulant to keep him from going into shock, and begins the slower process of applying kolto, disinfectant, bandaging. When it's done, he wips off his outer tunic and carefully eases it onto his friend.

"Who ever said black everything was a bad idea," he says, light and steady _,_ giving Evren a critical once over. No self-respecting parade field would buy it, but at least Evren won't draw any attention on Vaiken when the shoulder armor and vambraces go back on. And he hasn't agitated the wound any further. It's fine. Evren's going to be fine.

Evren eyes slide open. He blinks, and raises a hand to the bandages under the tunic. "That's what I keep saying," he rasps. "Never have to worry about mismatched s-socks, either . . . Thank you. I don't—thank you, my friend."

Ravaszhi manages a chuckle. "Careful who you tell that to. You might find yourself with a bright yellow pair one of these days. With Tauntauns on them. Cute ones." He edges backwards, picking up the remaining pieces of Evren's armor. "I'm afraid your chestplate is a lost cause."

Evren waves a hand. "Risk I'm willing to t-take. And I have to burn my inheritance on s-something, yes? As money sinks go it's hardly worthy of c-comment."

Ravaszhi hands Evren his gloves back, and starts putting the shoulder pieces back on him. "Is anything? Worthy of comment?" Inane questions, just to keep Evren talking. "Sometimes I get the impression I could acquire a small moon and no one would bat an eyelash."

Evren pulls the gloves on and fastens the vambraces over his forearms. "Probably not. Maybe a space s-station? Requires more labor to construct and maintain . . ."

"Good thing I don't plan on acquiring one," Ravaszhi says, with the same false lightness. The _Red Reaper_ is practically a space station, and the number of people outside Ikoral's influence who care about it can be counted on Ravaszhi's eight fingers. He finishes buckling Evren's shoulder armor back on, and then steps away, out of Evren's space.

They need to get him out of here. Ravaszhi should be doing more, there has to be more . . . but Evren is wounded and they need to leave. Now. "We should be able to hail the _Dorin's Sky_ from this console," he says.

Evren straightens, partially, still leaning hard against the console. "Wouldn't want them to worry," he says, and then sucks in a breath. "Wait. D-does your mission require the Foundry to remain functional, or . . . Someone will use it. The droids, they'll use the d-droids. We can't . . . is there a self-destruct? Could say Revan activated it before he died and—and we're not slicers, we couldn't shut it down, just call a shuttle and—something, I don't know, fuck . . ."

"No," Ravaszhi says slowly, "technically I'm only here to put a stop to Revan's plans." It would be a dangerous technicality to exploit if Ravaszhi's master were literally anyone else but . . . Darth Ikoral wouldn't want a thing like this in anyone's hands but his own, doesn't trust the Empire at large any more than Ravaszhi does. And Evren is right. If Revan and the Jedi were willing to use the Foundry for mass genocide against the Sith, what will the Sith themselves be willing to with it?

Ravaszhi isn't willing to find out. He looks over the console's interface, but it's all foreign to him. "Just once I'd like one of these to come with a big, red button."

"Too c-convenient, probably," Evren says, and knocks the console with the side of his boot. "Might not have a—a dedicated self-destruct, either. Could . . . something with the power c-core? Overload it? 'S what the Dorin's Sky crew t-tried . . ."

The Foundry isn't a Republic warship, it's an ancient alien space station-factory that has survived millennia without anything too important breaking, so perhaps not. "There might be controls in place against it overloading," Ravaszhi says dubiously, trying to sort through the available commands from the console. "What if . . . an explosion in the power core?"

"Possibly. Would it be t-too much to hope for that it'd set off a chain reaction of s-some kind?" Evren says with a weak laugh. "Or have I been watching too many bad h-holovids . . .?"

Or too much to hope for that something could just be simple, just once? "I know how we can find out," Ravaszhi says, pulling up the Foundry's blueprint. He points. "There's the power core." Then he squints at it, frowning. That can't be right.

Ravaszhi turns away from the console and looks up. "Oh." He's tilting his back as far is it will go and he can't even— "Oh, Evren, you should see this . . ."

It's . . . dizzying, impossible, beautiful. It's fractals of spinning metal and unsteady electric arcs suspended overhead in a reason-defying orbit. Past the floating machinery and crackling electricity and drifting fragments of metal-rich rock, the Foundry's heart is open to the glittering stars.

Evren looks up. And stares. "Oh," he echoes. "Bit of a structural v-vulnerability."

That it is. Ravaszhi grins. "Let's stick a lightsaber in it and see what happens."

Evren grins back. "Oh, would you l-look at that, I have two," he says, pulling his offhand and holding it out to Ravaszhi. "Do the honors?"

"With pleasure." Ravaszhi ignites the lightsaber and pulls his arm back to send it spinning for the Foundry's heart. Then he pauses, lowering his arm. "Can you run? If not you may want a headstart for the dropoff point."

"I can run." Evren's grin widens and Ravaszhi feels the dark side coalesce around and into him. Evren takes a step away from the console and gives it a pat, as if in thanks. "Calling our ride now," he says, reaching for his comm unit. "Wrath to Moff Phennir. Revan is dead but he's activated the Foundry's self-destruct."

The Moff looks pale, even for a hologram, his eyes wide. "My lord, we have slicers at the ready—"

"If there were time for that, I'd have mentioned it, Moff," Evren growls. "Proceeding to the evac point now. Prep the _Dorin's Sky_ for a hyperspace jump, and _don't be late_ to the pickup."

Ravaszhi feels for the hairline seams where the lightsaber's power cells and crystals align, pulls his arm back again, and throws. The lightsaber streaks away into the roiling mass of Force-fused technology, and Ravaszhi jerks at the crystals with the Force at the last moment before the blade hits.

He doesn't watch it happen but he doesn't need to—the noise almost breaks his eardrums, light like a thunderclap blooming out as the Foundry wrenches and bucks and _screams_.

"I TOLD you there was no time!" Evren shouts into his comm. He lets out a wild laugh as the entire station shakes and rumbles around them and they both sprint for the exit.

Their shadows stretch and waver before them, racing ahead, as the power core's destruction gathers momentum and fury. Ravaszhi slows his stride just enough to make sure Evren is at his elbow. They have minutes, maybe less, before everything goes up in flames, but that's going to be enough. They're going to make it.

 **o.O.o**

Back on the _Dorin's Sky_ , the Force is awash with the crew's relief and elation. Evren would be pleased at the lightened mood if it weren't so _loud_. Ravaszhi has retreated behind his shields again. Evren is mostly just trying to stay vertical.

He stumbles as they cross to the command platform, knocks Ravaszhi's shoulder with his own. He crosses an arm over his torso, eyes watering, and keeps breathing. "Mind playing crutch for a few minutes?" he says quietly, voice pitched under the hubbub of activity as the crew runs final checks for the hyperspace jump and the monitors beep and shrill with the Foundry's ongoing self-immolation.

"Whatever you need," Ravaszhi murmurs back. "Just tell me what I can do."

He lets himself lean into Ravaszhi again, closing his eyes for a moment. Contact is still . . . difficult, but it's better than collapsing in front of the bridge crew, and it's—sort of nice. Ravaszhi is solid and good and won't let him fall. _Thank you_ , he extends through the Force, a bit ragged with relief.

Evren snaps his eyes open. "Lieutenant," he says, catching the comms officer's attention, "contact the Fleet as soon as we're clear of the Foundry. Time to report to Darth Malgus."

The stars outside the viewport turn to silver streaks. Ravaszhi shifts his weight, and leaning on him while maintaining some scrap of dignity, or the illusion thereof, is suddenly a great deal easier.

Safely in hyperspace, the comms officer contacts the Fleet. "You have a clear holochannel to Vaiken Spacedock now, my lords."

Darth Malgus looks grim and forbidding as ever. "Lord Wrath. And . . . Lord Ravaszhi. I was not aware you were involved with this mission."

Evren raises an eyebrow. "He volunteered his services and was indispensable in the effort to thwart your missing Jedi Master. Revan is dead, and with him, his plan to annihilate the Empire by targeting anyone of Sith descent. Unfortunately he was able to destroy the Foundry before we could salvage it."

Malgus's eyes narrow. "We needed that factory, Wrath. The war with the Republic—"

"Grinds ever onward, and we are no worse off than we were before," Evren says impatiently.

"If the war has proven anything up to this point, it's that it won't be won by mere battle droids, no matter how useful," Ravaszhi says.

"Perhaps," Malgus says, "but the Empire prevails through both superior armaments and superior individuals, and the true Sith use every weapon in their arsenal to achieve victory. I suggest you remember that."

A piece of advice couched in a threat, or the other way around?

"Regardless," Malgus continues, "your victory has proven no would-be Sith or Jedi Master is a match for the Empire. Three centuries ago, Revan was strong in the dark side—a fallen Jedi the Emperor took an interest in. But he rebelled, and had to suffer. Now his story is ended." Malgus's tone is no more menacing than the Sith baseline, but Evren finds it difficult not to read a more threatening meaning into them. Directed at him, or Ravaszhi, or both. _Stay in line, or this will be your fate._

Malgus can't touch him, courtesy of the Hand, but that's hardly a comforting thought. As for Ravaszhi . . . It's not going to happen. He will not let it happen. Evren inclines his head in a shallow bow. "And the Empire endures," he says. "If there's nothing else . . .?"

"No. But I expect better results in the future, Wrath."

"I'm sure you do. Glory to the Empire," Evren says calmly, and signals the comms officer to cut the channel. Let Malgus be ruffled by the rudeness; at least then his ire will be focused on Evren himself, not Ravaszhi.

Who is lowering his shields enough to project—oh. _Quiet. Rest._ "My shuttle is at your disposal until we reach Vaiken, if you have need of anything," Ravaszhi says, Old Sith accent returning.

"Please, lead the way," Evren says, managing to keep his voice level and steady through the pain and sparking-bleeding _gratitude_. "There is a matter I would like to discuss with you." Vague enough to be meaningless, in-character enough to pass without comment from the bridge crew.

Ravaszhi remains at his side on the way back to his shuttle, still projecting _quiet_. "My cabin isn't locked, if you want to lie down," he offers.

"'Sappreciated," Evren mumbles, shambling in what he hopes is the right direction. "And—and c-could I? R-rest? It's . . . ow."

"It's this way," Ravaszhi says, voice soft, steering Evren towards the right door—and through, and towards the bed. "Do you need anything? I'm light on medical equipment but I have stims and pain suppressants."

"Favorite person," Evren enunciates. "Favorite. Person. Painkillers, p-please. Stims s-seem a bad idea . . ."

Ravaszhi looks confused for some reason. "I'll bring them," he says. "My holo unit is short range, but I can set it up in here if you need to contact anyone."

Why would he need a holo unit? "No, it's f-fine. But thank you for offering. Like I said," Evren says as he drops onto the bed. He winces as the mattress bounces, but throws a smile in Ravaszhi's direction. "You are m-my absolute favorite."

Ravaszhi blinks, stammers something near-incomprehensible about medkits, and backs out of the cabin. Evren stares blankly after him. Should he be worried? He should probably worry, but he doesn't know what to worry _about_ , so . . . generalized worry, then?

Ravaszhi returns with a smile and a box of pain suppressants. "The shot variety is the strongest, if you don't mind the drowsiness," he says.

More needles. Right. No. "Maybe s-something not-injected?" Evren says. If there were no other options . . . but there are, or at least Ravaszhi implied there are, and if he can't indulge his phobias occasionally then what is the _point_ of being a Dark Lord? "T-taking the edge off would be f-fine; I've s-slept through worse . . ."

"Try this," Ravaszhi says, pulling out one of the vials of blue, liquid pain-suppressant and handing it to Evren. "If you need them, there are more. And I—I can shield your mind from some of the pain if—if you'd like me to."

Evren accepts the vial, twists it open, and gulps its contents. The taste, calculated to be as inoffensive to the human and near-human palate as possible, still manages to elicit a grimace. "Augh. Er, thank you, but—"

He should refuse. What is he if he can't handle a little pain?

. . . He doesn't have to prove anything, here and now. But they've just—and Ravaszhi has already done so much, he can't ask him to—he _offered_ , though, so—

Evren rolls the empty vial between his palms and bows his head. "Only if you're all right with it. I d-don't—if you need to do anything else, please, f-feel free, I'm fine."

"I'm all yours," Ravaszhi says. "It's no trouble at all."

"Then, ah . . ." Call it weakness, call it anything, it _hurts_ and Ravaszhi is a friend and—and—Evren swallows. "Please?" he says.

"Of course," Ravaszhi says. He kneels by the side of the bed, and closes his eyes. The Force gathers around him like folds in a cloak even as his mental defenses dissolve. Trust. He still trusts Evren, even now, and—whatever else has happened or will, there's this. "Relax if you can," he instructs, and casts the cloak over Evren.

It's cool, and quiet, and still. Safe. The pain's not gone but it's—muffled. Distant. They're _safe_. Evren levers himself fully onto the cot and allows himself to let go of the Force entirely, for the first time in . . . months, it's been.

"Thank you," he says, and then laughs. "S-seem to be saying that a great deal, l-lately. But—I mean it. Thank you, my friend."

They're safe. Not whole and not all right but—they're here, and they're alive. It's enough.

 **o.O.o**

 _end_


End file.
